The Speed Of Mercury
by Gage39
Summary: Superman, Flash, Kid Flash, and Captain Marvel compete in a race to see who's the fastest in an effort to ditch group therapy with Black Canary. Rape/none-con of a minor briefly discussed. Nothing graphic!


The Speed Of Mercury

* * *

Black Canary took a deep breath and reminded herself to be calm as she stared at the six teenagers and one little boy sitting in front of her. "Are you sure you don't want to talk by yourself, Billy?" she asked again.

And, once again, she was vetoed by the small voice saying, "No," and shaking his head, a wild, terrified look in his blue eyes while the teenagers crowded even closer to him, somehow without physically touching him.

"And you really want to talk about," she hesitated then pushed on, "what happened with them present?"

"They were there," Billy whispered. "They should be here too."

"We won't leave you," Artemis promised, carefully patting the thick black hair.

"Not unless you want us to," M'gann added.

Billy shook his head even harder. "Don't go."

"We won't," Conner spoke up this time.

"No matter what," Wally said.

"No matter how whelmed you are," Robin said.

"I do not understand what Robin just said but I do get the general idea and add my oath," Kaldur said solemnly.

Black Canary just sighed. It was bad enough that one of the members of the Justice League was a child but it was even worse that said child had been raped while on a mission, attempting to save M'gann from the same fate. The Justice League had been thrown into turmoil, trying to decide what to do with Captain Marvel and, until then, Black Canary had been ordered to continue her counseling sessions as normal. She just hadn't anticipated "group therapy", with all of the Young Justice members refusing to leave. If it had just been M'gann that would have been one thing; she could have understood that. But _all_ six of them? Clearly the group had grown closer than they previously thought. In which case it would be even more difficult to split them up if they decided that Captain Marvel was too young to be fighting crime. Now that she thought about it, she didn't want to be the one to break the news if it came to that. She would let Batman have the honor or Superman since he seemed to be the closest to the young child.

"Fine," she said. "I guess the first thing I want to know is how do you feel?"

Billy gave her a look that clearly said he thought she was nuts. "I was raped in front of the people that I think of as family. How do you think I feel?"

Okay. He was definitely hostile. She mentally wrote the word down and continued with her questions. "Do you feel ashamed? Like you should have done something more?"

Billy stiffened as did the others. "Do you think I could have done more?"

Belatedly, even as Conner growled and clenched his fists, she realized that she had gone too far and began backpedaling. "I think you did everything you could under the circumstances but what about you? Do _you_ think you could have done more?"

Billy bit his lip and looked down at the ground. He gave a careless shrug of his shoulders, a bruise on his neck (one that looked suspiciously like a bite mark) visible as he said, "I don't know."

A tear rolled down his cheek as M'gann wrapped her arms around him and gave Black Canary a dirty look. "You did your best, Billy," she whispered. "No one's saying otherwise."

At this point Black Canary considered resigning as counselor and giving the job to J'onn instead. He was so much better at reading emotions than she was.

"Who's up for a race?" Wally interjected.

"What kind of race?" Billy asked, peeking over M'gann's shoulder.

Wally grinned. It was one of those grins that automatically put people on edge and had them locking up their valuables. "The best kind," he said mysteriously.

* * *

One Hour Later

"How did I get talked into this?" Flash asked no one in particular.

"Because you love me," Wally blinked his green eyes up at his uncle, the endearing look lost on everyone.

"No, seriously, how _did_ I get talked into this?" Flash insisted.

"Because Wally threatened to call you a chicken if you didn't," Superman answered.

"Why are you even in this race?" Flash asked suddenly. "We all know you're slower than me."

"Because Billy wanted me in it," Superman answered.

"Oh." Well. That certainly cleared things up. Apparently, Superman just couldn't say no to anything that Billy asked. Although, Flash doubted that any of the Justice League would have said no after...after what happened on the Young Justice team's last mission. Everyone was still reeling from finding out Captain Marvel's real age, not to mention what had occurred during his protection of a team member. They had all been forbidden from mentioning the "r-word" around him for the forseeable future or around any of the other kids. Apparently Superboy kept slugging the speaker and Flash had no desire to be on the wrong side of those fists.

"Are we ever going to start this race or not?" Captain Marvel complained, practically bouncing up and down. "I'm bored."

"Patience, my dear Captain," Wally answered. "We just have to wait for the rest of the judges to arrive."

"Why am I holding a stopwatch?" Batman asked Robin.

"Because you're a judge," Robin answered.

Batman sighed and rolled his eyes.

"So we are determing which of the four is faster?" J'onn clarified. "Superman, Captain Marvel, Flash or Kid Flash?"

"That's right," M'gann confirmed.

"Kaldur, what's this called?" Aquaman asked, squinting at the small device he held in his hand.

"I believe it's called a stopwatch, my liege. You will use it to determine which of them is faster," Kaldur replied.

"How come Black Canary doesn't have to be a judge?" Green Arrow wanted to know as he checked his stopwatch to make sure it was working.

"Because she's our counselor," Artemis said in a "you-should-already-know-that" tone of voice.

"Can we get started now?" the black Green Lantern asked.

"On your mark, get set, go!" Hawkwoman yelled and the race was on.

Kid Flash ran as fast as he can, groaning in humiliation when he felt the first blur pass by him. "Way to go, Uncle Barry," he grumbled. The second blur passed. "Superman," he sighed. The third blur. "And Captain Marvel."

"And the winner is..." Hawkwoman paused for effect. "Captain Marvel!"

"What!" Kid Flash skidded to a stop and saw a grinning Captain Marvel jumping up and down excitedly as Flash stared at him shock while Superman smiled at the younger hero and congratulated him. "Captain Marvel won?!" he raced over to his uncle. "Did you let him win?" he asked in a whisper.

Flash shook his head. "No," he whispered hoarsely. "I didn't."

Wally's eyes widened for a second then, with a grin, he clapped his uncle on the back and said, "Congratulations on being the second fastest man alive!"

* * *

A/N: Last story. Should be posting a new story about Captain Marvel (probably under the Justice League category though) in a couple of days or whenever I get my laptop to work. Please review!


End file.
